We are in Japan! Actually we:re now in day 3 of our stay here. We`re all still a little jet-lagged, but all in all we:ve recovered pretty well!
(By the way, before I continue, I:ll apologize now for the typing. This is a Japanese keyboard ... a little difficult!)
Right now it:s Monday morning in Nagoya Japan, where we are currently. But here`s what has happened so far ... It`s been incredible. We arrived in Tokyo on Saturday evening, and were met by our "English speaking" guide. I use the term "English speaking" somewhat loosely, although I will say that she was VERY nice, and her English was certainly better than my Japanese. ;-)
The good news is that we made it to our hotel without incident. From there we took taxis to the INCREDIBLE 28th story apartment of John Carrington, an American executive working for GE, and his wife Noha. We visited with them a while, and enjoyed what was described as the best view of Tokyo. (He wasn:t kidding ... It really was! Absolutely amazing!)
We then proceeded to a phenomenal Japanese restaurant that looked like something straight out of a Japanese samurai movie. Get this: We had dinner in the same room where the Japanese prime minister and the US president also had dinner. What an experience ... We took off our shoes, sat at Japanese style tables, and had an incredible multiple course Japanese meal.
After that we toured through the Rappongi area, which is a big ex-patriate hangout and party area. Uh, let:s just say that it was an experience!
On Sunday morning we attended a lecture and Q&A by Dr. Michael Portoff, the CEO and President of Bayer Japan and Chairman of Bayer Asia (and thanks to Father Sean Hogan at Duquesne at Ed White at Bayer for setting that up). All I can say is ... wow. What an interesting session! Dr. Portoff and his wife Beatrice were incredibly knowledgeable, and incredibly warm and gracious. And the setting was stunning -- a beautiful conference room on the 29th floor, with a panoramic view of Tokyo.
And on it went ... on Sunday afternoon we met up with our tour guide, George Godoy, from Liverpool England but a resident of Tokyo for the past 33 years. He:s also an expert on Tokyo and fluent in Japanese. He took us on a walking tour of Tokyo (which also included the subway), where we visited the Meiji Shrine. We then headed on to Harajuku, where the local young people dress in the most outrageous attire and basically just hang out. There are some VERY freaky people there, although I must say that it:s hard to take them very seriously (basically they were wearing halloween costumes, complete with faces made up.) We also ate and did some shopping on the Omotesand Dori (the "Champs Elysee" of Tokyo), and then headed off to the train station.
At Shinagawa train station, we said goodbye to George and boarded the Nozomi Shinkansen (bullet train) for Nagoya. At 170mph, we were in Nagoya in about an hour and a half (I say "about", but I can tell you that the trains here are on time to the nano-second!) In Nagoya we were met by our hosts from Nanzan University. We had a quick dinner, and then took the subway to Nanzan University (actually the conference center -- the accomodations are fairly simple, but very comfortable; the main downside is they lock the doors at 11PM, which is a bit constraining to some of the students!)
Today we are at Nanzan University attending lectures. This afternoon we:ll head to the Toyota Museum. Tomorrow we:ll go to the Aichi World Exposition, which looks incredible (robots, wooly mammoths, giant HDTV screens, etc.). And we will take the maglev train to get there, which will also be a new experience. Then on Wednesday we head to Kyoto for the day; on Thursday we:ll leave Nagoya for Mt. Fuji; on Friday we fly to Beijing. Whew! And this is just week 1!
Alas, our internet access here is VERY limited, which means that the students won:t be able to send email, and this will probably be my last posting before we get to Beijing (I had to convince someone to let me use the computer here!)
Also, this is a Windows 98 computer ... which you probably don:t really care about ... but it does mean that the computer won:t recognize my compact flash drive ... which means that I can:t post photographs from here. :-( But hopefully that will change in Beijing!
Okay, that:s it for now. Stay tuned for news from China ... hopefully soon after we arrive!
Sayonara!
